Skin Sensitivity

Because we have spent so much time using this blog as a medical journal for us to look back upon for reference, I am again posting a medical issue. Since Maggie has come home from the hospital, she has had more extensive skin sensitivity. Being that she has fair skin with the auburn hair, she has always had sensitive skin, but we have seen very extreme cases in the last few months. We attributed it to the anti-viral medicine she is on. If she goes out in the sun for a minute, her skin becomes very red. She burns very easily and if she is hot, she will have a flush look about her on her face and arms. We get comments all the time about her being sunburned, in which I always have to explain the situation (I don't want them thinking I am a bad parent for not putting sunscreen on my child).

Back in May, Maggie rubbed up again some bushes which created a blister. Of course we were very worried about this as we are extra sensitive to skin issues. We thought it was a reaction to the rose bushes and in time, it went away. Then other blisters started popping up on her arms from where she had a cut or scrape. It seemed anytime Maggie took any insult to her skin (mainly her arms), a blister would appear.

On Thursday Maggie went for a walk with Andy and the next morning I saw several red welts on Maggie's arms--mosquito bites. By afternoon, she had scratched the one and a blister had popped up. It was the size of a dime and soon she got hold of the other bites and little blisters had appeared. We covered them up with band-aids to disallow her from any more scratching (she likes to pick at scabs when she is falling asleep). By Saturday, the blister had doubled in size. Andy was quite nervous, so he called Dr. French. Dr. French was cool, as always, and told him to cover it and wait for it to pop.

I decided today to give the hemoc clinic a call again to see if there is anything we could put on the blister as it appeared to have grown larger. After talking to a nurse and sending a picture of the blister to her via email, she called back. She immediately said, "that's an impressive looking blister." It is not anything they have ever seen before (of course Maggie always has to be the rare bird), and they immediately called dermatology to get Maggie in for an appointment. Normally it takes a month to get in, but there was a cancellation for tomorrow, so we will again expand our specialist portfolio. Though I am not fond of dermatologists, given that that was how we started this whole mess of leukemia, the nurse did say it has nothing to do with relapse and Dr. French thinks it's an immune system response. Andy had previously looked up some information and found the same suggestion.

I am posting a picture of this "impressive and rare" blister for us to catalog into our medical journal. Just a warning that what you are about to see is graphic and may not want to view it.

On a side note, we are visiting the orthopedic doctor again tonight to take a look at Maggie's leg. She continues to not put any weight on her leg and is not crawling or moving much. The point of the cast was for Maggie to be able to continue walking while it healed. It has not done that and instead has immobilized her even more. My hope is that the cast might be able to be taken off to allow Maggie to not be paralyzed to the same spot on the floor. While I was on the phone extensively on Friday trying to convey my concern of her immobility, they feel that she most likely has a hairline fracture given her leg history. We will see what comes of our visit tonight.

Might we say Maggie likes to keep us and the doctors on our toes?